Midnight Rider (Ralph Cotton Western Series)

by Ralph Cotton

  “The doctor in Dunbar is a drunkard and an opium smoker,” the Giant said.

  “So?” Rochenbach responded.

  “Nothing,” said the Giant. He shrugged. “Just thought I’d mention it.”

  Casings shook his head and fell behind Rochenbach on the narrow path.

  “Come on, Giant,” he said, “I know when I’m not wanted.” He grinned, holding the bandanna to his wounded side.

  “Me too,” said the Giant, turning to follow Casings. A stray bullet zipped past and opened a seam on the shoulder of his coat. The impact of the shot startled him. “Whoa, let’s get out of here!”

  When they’d reached the horses, the Giant looked back and forth, deciding which horse would be strong enough to carry him down off the trail and into Dunbar. Bullets continued to slice through the treetops.

  “Take two, Giant!” Casings said, getting impatient. As he spoke, he pulled the reins to three horses loose from a rope hitch line tied between two trees. He handed two sets of reins to the Giant.

  “I want to leave a good horse for you, Rock,” the Giant said.

  “Don’t worry about me, Giant,” Rochenbach said. “My horse is standing right there. You’re the one needs medical attention.”

  Climbing into the saddle, Casings spun his horse toward Rochenbach and pointed a finger at him.

  “Dunbar, Rock,” he said. “Don’t make us come back looking for you.”

  “I’ll be there before you are if you don’t get going,” Rock said. He slapped the horse’s rear. Casings galloped away, the Giant right beside him, leading a spare horse for himself.

  Halfway down the trail, both men slowed their horses a little and looked back toward the raging gunfire.

  “What the hell is Rock up to?” the Giant asked.

  “I have no idea,” said Casings. “Whatever it is, he wants to handle it himself.” He shrugged and booted the horse forward. “He’s been straight with us. This is what he wants, this is what he gets.”

  “Dang it, I’m starting to bleed all over again,” the Giant said.

  Casings looked him up and down, seeing fresh blood on his wide chest, his sides, running down the back of his hand from under his sleeve.

  “So are you, Pres,” the Giant said, gesturing toward the fresh blood soaking through the shoulder of Casings’ coat.

  “Yeah, I know,” Casings said. “Got to get to that doctor in Dunbar.…” He booted his horse forward, back up into a gallop.…

  With the two wounded men out of sight, Rochenbach jerked his horse’s reins free from the hitch line and stepped up into his saddle. The big dun grumbled and chuffed and slung its head back and forth before Rock collected it with a strong draw of the reins.

  “I’ve missed you too,” he said wryly to the horse. He booted the big, restless dun onto another thin path leading diagonally up the hillside toward the fighting.

  As he neared the edge of the trail, he swung the dun wide to his left, avoided the fighting and climbed up a steep rocky path as far as the spirited horse could take him.

  Jumping down from the saddle, he wrapped the dun’s reins around the saddle horn and slapped its rump, sending it back down the steep path toward the trail. He reached down and jerked the knife from his boot well.

  Ten yards to his right, slightly above him among a stand of rock, he saw gray looming smoke and heard steady rifle fire raining down on the soldiers below.

  A good place to start, he told himself.

  Shoving the knife down behind his belt, he stepped over onto a foothold in the rocky hillside and climbed hand over hand until he reached the edge of a cliff. He rolled onto his hands and knees on a narrow ledge and stopped for a moment to look around quickly.

  Twelve feet away, at the far end of the ledge, he saw Lyle Myers staring down his rifle barrel, firing round after round, the rifle bucking repeatedly in his hands.

  Rochenbach snatched the knife from his waist and sprang forward, coming up off all fours like a mountain cat. Myers saw his attacker coming from the corner of his eye. He swung his rifle around to meet him, but he was too late. Rock blocked the rifle with his forearm as he brought the steel point of the blade up between Meyers’ ribs and buried it in his heart.

  Myers’ rifle fell from his hands at Rock’s feet. He rose onto his toes as if to get away from the sharp bite of the blade, but there was no escaping it. His mouth and eyes opened wide. Rochenbach’s arm slipped around his shoulders and embraced him like an old friend. He held Myers in place until the weight of him fell forward, lifeless against him.

  Jerking the blade from Myers’ chest as he fell, Rock stepped back and to the side. Then he wiped the blade across the dead man’s back and quickly picked up the smoking rifle. He checked it and looked farther along the ridgeline as he slipped a big, bone-handled Colt from Myers’ hip and stuck it into his empty belly holster.

  Standing in a crouch, he picked up a bandoleer of ammunition and slung it over his shoulder. Below him the fighting raged. Along the ridgeline stretched out before him, he saw two separate clouds of looming gray smoke. He heard the endless explosions of gunfire.

  “One down, two to go,” he murmured to himself.

  He climbed a steep footpath to the spot where Lyle Myers’ horse stood hitched to a scrub juniper. He snatched the horse’s reins free and slipped up into the saddle. Rifle in hand, he booted the blaze-faced chestnut out along the rocky ridgeline.

  When he got to the next gunman’s position, he saw the man’s horse reined to a stand of rocks. While the gunman stood looking down over the edge of the trail, his full attention focused on firing madly down at the soldiers, Rock slipped from his saddle and reined the chestnut next to the other animal. As the two horses nosed each other’s muzzles, Rock slipped over to the edge in a crouch and stared at the gunman from twenty feet.

  As if suddenly realizing someone was watching him from behind, Frank Penta turned around, smoking rifle in hand, and looked at Rochenbach through a haze of gun smoke. Seeing that Rockenbach had him cold, the rifle in Rock’s hands pointed, aimed and cocked at him, Penta gave him a strange, tight grin.

  “Some fight, huh, Rock?” he called out above the roar of gunfire, sounding as if the two of them had been close friends.

  “Yes, it is,” Rock agreed. His right eye fixed down the rifle sights, he squeezed the trigger. Penta dropped his rifle and clasped his chest with both hands as he staggered backward. He caught himself at the edge of the cliff for just a second. Then he fell off the cliff and bounced down the steep, rocky hillside.

  Rochenbach looked toward the next looming cloud of smoke thirty yards away. He levered a fresh round into his rifle chamber and walked back to the horses. Before stepping into the saddle, he dropped the saddle and bridle from Penta’s horse and slapped its rump. As the horse bolted away, the chestnut tugged at its hitched reins, trying to run alongside the freed animal.

  “Not you,” Rock said to the chestnut. “Not yet anyway.”

  Looking along the ridgeline, he heard one shot fire at the trail below. Then he saw Dent Spiller scramble over the edge of the cliff and run to his waiting horse. The gunman grabbed his horse’s reins, jumped into his saddle and raced away, not giving Rochenbach so much as a glance.

  Rock raised his rifle to take aim, but Spiller disappeared over a rise on the hilltop and thundered down the trail. Lowering his rifle, Rock turned and stepped up into his saddle. Noting that the firing below had waned over the past few minutes, he gave the chestnut a tap of his boots and rode away.

  Realizing they’d been caught in a trap, Grolin and Swank leaped atop their horses and fled the trail as soon as the rifle fire from their men above the trail came to a stop. As they beat a hasty retreat around the turn in the trail, Swank looked at the reins to Bobby Kane’s horse in Grolin’s hand, Kane riding along close behind him.

  “Why are you keeping that idiot alive?” Swank shouted at him.

  But Grolin didn’t answer. He kept his head down and rode hard toward Dun
bar.

  Silas Dooley and the Dog fought on fiercely for a few minutes longer, until they saw Dent Spiller ride down a thin path and across the trail twenty yards away and keep on riding.

  “What the hell was that?” Dooley cried out as shots still whistled past them.

  “That was the last of our rifle cover running out on us!” said the Dog.

  “Damn it!” said Dooley. He looked down the trail toward the empty wagon, then back to the Dog as two more bullets sliced past them. “What the hell are we waiting for?”

  “Beats me,” said Lou. “I’ve been ready.” He turned and ran in a crouch in the same direction their spooked horses had taken toward the turn in the trail.

  “That bastard Swank!” said Dooley, running right beside him. “He led us right into this—made it sound easy, talking about taking the gold away from Grolin and his men!”

  “He shoulda hit a little harder on what we’d have to do to get it from these fellows first!” shouted Lou.

  The two continued running away even as the firing slowed to a stop behind them.

  Chapter 26

  Rochenbach caught sight of the two fleeing gunmen as he rode from the ridgeline back down onto the trail. But he didn’t have time to raise his rifle and fire at them before they’d disappeared out of sight around the turn to where their horses stood beside the trail. Instead, he booted the chestnut on to where his big dun stood at the foot of the path he’d sent it running down.

  “Glad to see you made it,” he said to the waiting horse.

  He picked up the reins from around the dun’s saddle horn and had started to lead the animal away when he saw Trooper Lukens spring out of the brush on the other side of the trail with a rifle pointed at him.

  “All right, Smith, drop the gun! Drop it now!” the young soldier said, his voice sounding nervous and uncertain. He stood pale-faced and covered with fresh blood. But upon closer look, Rochenbach saw no signs of a wound on him.

  “Do you hear me, Smith?” the trooper said. “Drop that rifle before I shoot!”

  Rochenbach ignored his order and let out a breath.

  “Where’s the captain, Trooper?” he asked, seeing the young soldier squeeze his hand tight around his saddle carbine.

  Lukens’ strong demeanor appeared to almost melt at the mention of the captain. His face took on a worried look.

  “He’s—he’s down off the side of the trail with the horses,” he said. “He’s been shot bad.”

  Oh no.…

  Rochenbach winced and swung down from his saddle and led both horses toward the edge of the trail.

  “How bad?” he asked as he led the two animals into the cover of rock and brush.

  “I told you to drop that rifle, Smith!” Lukens shouted suddenly, trying to take charge. He looked all around, frightened.

  “Well, I’m not going to, Trooper,” said Rock, “so shut up about it and let’s see about the captain. How bad is he?” he repeated.

  “As bad as ever I’ve seen, Smith,” Lukens said, swallowing a knot in his throat.

  “You know there’s a doctor in Dunbar,” Rochenbach said, gesturing the young soldier in front and following him down the hillside.

  “I’m thinking he’s past doctoring, to be honest with you,” Lukens said.

  Rochenbach winced again.

  In the small clearing where the soldiers’ horses stood, the wounded captain raised his head and looked up from where he lay slumped back against a tree. The center of his chest was covered with dark blood. His right hand held a blood-soaked bandanna against the wound. An open canteen rested against the side of his leg.

  “A soldier… should not die… out of uniform,” he rasped, seeing Rochenbach walk toward him.

  Rochenbach stooped down beside him. He lifted his hand and the bandanna a little and examined the wound closely, seeing the severity of it.

  “You’re a soldier, Captain, uniform or not,” he said. “There’s no doubt about that.”

  “I—I saw you,” Captain Boone said, clutching his forearm with his other bloody hand. “You were up there… shooting at them. You were on our side.”

  “Don’t tell anybody,” Rochenbach said. “You’ll ruin my reputation.”

  “Who are you, Smith?” the captain said. “I know there’s more to you… than you told me.”

  Rochenbach saw the man was dying. He tossed a glance up toward Lukens. Captain Boone caught the look.

  “Trooper… go look the wagon over good,” he told Lukens. “We’ve got… to load the gold when the others arrive.”

  Lukens looked hesitantly at Rochenbach.

  “Go on, Trooper,” urged the captain. “This man is no longer a prisoner.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Lukens, looking a little relieved. Turning on his heel, he hurried away through the brush and toward the trail.

  “You’re hauling that gilded junk out of here, are you, Captain?” Rochenbach asked as soon as Lukens was out of sight.

  “Of course… we are,” said the wounded captain with a crooked, bloody smile. “That’s the mission.” He coughed and looked back at Rochenbach. “Now, who are you, Smith? I don’t want to die wondering.”

  “Remember the identity code you asked me for? I told you I’d forgotten the four numbers?”

  Boone nodded his head weakly, a knowing look coming upon his pale face—a look of satisfaction.

  Here goes…, Rock told himself.

  “My name is Avrial Rochenbach, Captain,” he said in a low voice. He glanced around, then leaned in closer and whispered the four numbers into the captain’s ear.

  Boone gave a smile of recognition. “I knew it. I was right… you’re the government man.”

  “Shhh,” said Rochenbach. “My reputation.”

  “Yes, of course, your reputation…” Boone managed another bloody smile. “Tell me, Avrial Rochenbach. Did we do… this right, all of us, together?” Boone asked, his voice fading fast.

  “We did it all the best we could, Captain, under the circumstances,” said Rochenbach. “We always do, folks like you and me. We’re fellow countrymen.”

  “Fellow countrymen. That’s good… to hear,” said Boone. His grin turned to a faint smile as more blood seeped from his trembling lips. “I’m going on now…,” he whispered.

  “Captain?” Rochenbach started to shake him a little, but he stopped himself, seeing it would do no good.

  Captain Boone’s eyes glazed over. His hand fell away from Rochenbach’s forearm.

  Adios, Captain.…

  Rochenbach wasn’t about to tell the dying captain how foolish he thought this had been, men dying over worthless plated gold. All this just so he could ferret out the name of one man—a man in a position of public trust, who used his position to steal from the very people who had bestowed that trust upon him.

  Shame on you, Inman S. Walker.

  He reached out and closed the captain’s eyes.

  “He was felled by the last shot fired from up on the ridgeline,” Trooper Lukens said, walking up quietly behind Rochenbach.

  Rochenbach considered it, picturing Spiller running to his horse, his rifle in hand. He reached down and pulled his Remington from the captain’s belt and stood up, letting the gun hang down his right side. In his left hand he held his rifle.

  “I’m leaving,” he said flatly, giving Lukens a flat, determined stare.

  “Go on, then,” said Lukens. “Captain Boone said you’re not a prisoner anymore. That’s good enough for me.”

  Rochenbach turned to get his horses.

  “You best hurry on, Smith,” said Lukens. He gestured a nod upward toward the trail. “I saw Sergeant Goodrich and a couple others limping along the trail, headed this way. They’re chewed up, but they might shoot you on sight.”

  “Obliged, Trooper,” Rochenbach said. He walked back through the brush to where the two horses stood waiting. He left the blaze-faced chestnut where it stood, stepped up atop the big dun and rode away, down through the trees toward the tra
il leading to Dunbar.

  Pres Casings lay on a gurney in the surgery room of the doctor’s office in Dunbar. Afternoon sunlight spread slantwise across the floor through an open window. The Stillwater Giant, being too large for a gurney, was stretched out on two dinner-sized tables standing along the wall to keep from blocking the whole room. The doctor stood over his massive chest with a pair of long, tapered surgery tongs.

  “My goodness,” the bald, middle-aged doctor said, staring at the round stone he’d pulled out of the Giant’s chest with the tongs. “This is most unusual.” A long, dark strand of congealed blood hung from the stone.

  “What is, Doc?” the Giant asked, raising his head a little and staring along with the doctor.

  “I probed for a bullet, but I pulled this stone from between your ribs.

  “Oh, that…,” said the Giant, laying his head back down. “I stuck it there.”

  “You stuck a stone in your chest wound?” the doctor asked in disbelief.

  “I just wanted to see if it would stop the bleeding,” the Giant said with a big-toothed grin. “It stopped it, huh?”

  “Well… yes, it appears that it did,” the doctor said. He dropped the stone into a pan.

  From his gurney, Casings listened and smiled to himself.

  “Doc, he stuck rocks in his wounds when we stopped to water our horses at a creek. That’s why he wanted you to attend to me first. Right, Giant?”

  “Yep,” the Giant said proudly. “I was in no hurry once the bleeding stopped.”

  The doctor looked at the Giant’s other wounds, bullet holes crusted over with dried blood.

  “So, am I to believe I’ll be finding more of these stones inside you, Mr. Garth?”

  “Yep,” the Giant said. “There’s one stone per bullet hole. I didn’t stick them in too deep, but riding might’ve stuck them deeper.” He grinned. “I thought about sticking more than one in a couple of the holes. But I was afraid it might be harmful.”